Cymru Fyw Discussion

Fe is standard in the Southern SSiW course. Not too sure it’s very formal. :thinking:

Fe here doesn’t mean it or he. It’s the positive marker like “mi”. It’s not necessarily formal but in formal writing they seem to favour fe over mi

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Oh sorry, I didn’t pay enough attention to the whole sentence.

Therefore, since as far as I know aeth refers to third person singular, fe would kinda match (no matter where it’s placed). So I just assumed it would mean he/it.

I guess the problem is I I have no idea of what a positive marker is! :grimacing:

I’ve no idea if it’s unique to Cymraeg but it’s the only place I’ve found it! So a positive marker means that the sentence is definitely positive. Not always necessary of course but has a bit of Cymraeg-ness to it that I love :slight_smile:

So “Fe aeth e i’r…” Would mean exactly the same as “aeth e i’r…”. Fe doesn’t really add anything just shows its positive beyond doubt, I guess.

So “Fe aeth hi…” “Fe aethon ni…” “Fe aethoch chi” etc.

You’ll also hear “mi aeth o/e/hi” - mi acts the same way.

Interestingly in the article Huw Jones uses both.

"…mi drodd y peth allan yn reit dda ac mi roedd ganddon ni dâp wedyn.
“Fe benderfynon ni yn y diwedd mai beth…”

So “Fe benderfynon ni…” Is the same as “penderfynon ni”

I’ve tended to see “Fe” more in news articles (so formal writing) than “mi”. But, as I said, that might just be me noticing that not actually true that it’s used more.

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Thanks a lot for the explanations!

While researching a bit about these artists and Sain, I saw that Huw Jones is from Cardiff - so he might use expressions that are more common in that area.

While I have reasons to believe :grin: that at BBC Fyw when they need to correct, re-organize, translate or even just summarize something that an interviewee has said, they tend to use a very Northern-flavored/ journalist-formal Welsh.

So maybe Huw Jones really uses both when he speaks.

Or maybe it’s mi when they quote him word-by-word in a colloquial style, fe when they rephrase it in more formal Welsh - if your observations are correct.

Or if it’s a regional thing fe when they quote him word-by-word, mi when they rephrased it - if it’s a regional thing instead.

Just a tiny and probably unimportant detail, but since this thread is meant to analyze texts I guess it’s not too off topic, is it?

Wow that is all very interesting!

Any ideas about what it would be called in a grammar book/website?

I have made a good start on the next article but I obviously need to read it again because I can’t work out whether @aran thinks he is still a learner or not :joy:

The BBC Grammar guide says this:

"…in ordinary speech, we tend to place the particles

Mi - North Wales Fe - South Wales

in front of the verb forms. These words have no translatable value but they have something to do with the rhythm of the language (much like a ‘leading note’ in music – a note which leads in to the beat!)"

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Gareth King refers to it as an ‘affirmative marker’ and says it’s a “characteristic of spoken Welsh” with geographical location determining whether you’re more likely to hear “fe” or “mi” though he says that in some areas they don’t appear to be used at all, so they are completely optional.

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